Overview
South Africa has a two-tiered, and highly unequal, healthcare system. The public sector is state-funded and caters to the majority – 71% – of the population. The private sector is largely funded through individual contributions to medical aid schemes or health insurance and serves around 27% of the population. The public sector is underfunded while most South Africans can’t afford the exorbitant cost of private care. South Africa’s biggest problem is that the health needs of its people exceed capacity, and the public sector is overburdened in comparison to the private sector. South Africa also faces the challenge of doctors and other medical healthcare professionals leaving the country.
NGOs are major role players in the healthcare sector, as they fill the vacuum created by governments’ inability to honour their social contract, particularly in a developing country like South Africa. However, the role of NGOs in the development process does not come easily, as they are faced with several challenges. Amongst those challenges is not having enough hands to assist and provide satisfactory care to patients therefore volunteers become essential to NGO’s. As a volunteer you offer a helping hand by doing basic healthcare and administration tasks to enable the trained staff to assess patients and begin treatments.
You will need to be over the age of 21 to take part in this healthcare volunteering project.
Highlights
- This project helps those children most in need of respite care.
- Provides children with a safe, secure place to stay as they make the first steps towards a healthier future.
- It helps adults with chronic illnesses by providing temporary shelter. Most of the patients are referred by local hospitals, clinics, or other health facilities for a 3–6-week restorative period.
- Their commitment is for all patients to be restored physically, mentally, spiritually, and emotionally, and ensure that this happens during their stay at the adult respite centre.
- Each day a team made up of a senior nurse and 3 carers walk through the poorest neighbourhoods offering medical support and attention to those who are house bound.
